When my car broke down on a rainy evening, he drove across town to help me, even though he’d already worked a ten-hour shift.
When I cried on the anniversary of Dad’s death, he didn’t tell me to move on. He held me while I talked about the man I missed.
He even learned how to make Dad’s pancakes.
His first attempt was so terrible that we ended up ordering breakfast from a nearby café.
But he tried again the following Sunday.
And the Sunday after that.
Eventually, he got them right.
That was Ethan.
He wasn’t the kind of man who made grand speeches about love.
He showed it in small, stubborn acts of devotion.
Unfortunately, my mother had never learned to measure a man that way.
At Christmas one year, she handed Ethan a gift bag in front of the entire family.
He opened it and found a gift card to an employment agency.
